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 Posted: Sun Apr 02, 2006 2:38 pm
"It is most certainly your place to interact with your own pack." Drik assured her, his lips pulling back in a slightly-lopsided grin. If possible, it made him look even MORE unsettling.
"I believe we were all found and welcomed here for a reason." he went on. "Choma is a very gracious alpha, is she not? Since she, herself, was granted a second chance, she believes everyone ought to have one. And so we have."
He looked about himself at the silent early morning woods with what seemed to be satisfaction.
"You are one of the saved, Mire. Whatever has happened to you...that is no longer an issue here. There is not one among us who ought to hold it against you."
Now that the stage had been set, he felt it safe to begin to pry a bit. "It surely couldn't have been THAT bad, could it...?"
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Posted: Sun Apr 02, 2006 5:00 pm
Mire's eyes squeezed shut at his question as a flush of shame passed through her. She had heard the disgust in Choma's voice when they had talked last for the idea that she had once lived among humans...why share what a revolting creature she was with anyone else?
"F-Forgive me..." she stuttered, her ears having practically vanished into her headfur. "....It's something I don't care to talk about."
And none of your business besides...!! the tiny and almost-forgotten voice of her dignity squeaked on its own.
...yes, and that as well. It very much WAS none of his business. However, she would be struck dead before daring to tell him so. If he had any decency, he would realize this on his own. But then, how decent could one be who went about looking the way he did? It was quite apparant that other's thoughts about him were something he cared little for if he was able to walk around stinking of the grave and still manage to not be extremely self-conscious.
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Posted: Sun Apr 02, 2006 5:16 pm
"Oh?" Drik asked, seeming genuinely puzzled. "It must have been terrible for you, then, whatever it was..."
He began to realize now why he found himself growing fond of the little omega. It was not because of her voice, it was not because of the way she posed no threat whatsoever, it was not even because a small part of him found her pup-like fear to be charming...
...it was because she reminded him of Tawna. The way she'd been before the two of them had become mates. Both of them in their older pack had begun at the bottom rung as omegas. It was not until the two of them had overturned others to become gammas that the alphas had even entertained the notion of granting the two of them breeding rites.
She had been so lovely once she'd been instilled with a bit of confidence...it had occurred to Drik with slight amusement that it was not until she began holding her head up that he had noticed her eyes were amber.
He saw the same potential in this one. Potential to be another Tawna. To be beautiful for him again...
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Posted: Sun Apr 02, 2006 5:20 pm
He was staring now, and she felt pinned beneath the gaze of both his good eye and his dead one. Squirming uncomfortably, she turned her head away and pretended with all of her might that he was not there.
And then, suddenly, something surfaced in her mind like a glimmer of silver against a sea of endless black. A presense. A name.
just like my tawna. beautiful. strong. my tawna. tawna. tawna.
"Tawna..." she repeated aloud to herself, confused.
It was as though a finger had touched a hot iron that the name and presense withdrew from her mind with jolting force, enough to make her head rock back on her neck as she blinked worriedly.
What...?
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Posted: Sun Apr 02, 2006 6:17 pm
The look of friendliness faded from Drik's face almost immediately as his expression shifted into one of shock, and then to one of deep suspicion.
He had not spoken of Tawna to anyone since arriving here. He had mentioned vaguely that he had had a mate once....but he had left it at simply that -- a mate.
He had not once called her by name. Not ONCE...
"How do you know that name...?" he demanded to know, his hackles bristling along the curve of his spine as he regarded the omega through one narrowed eye.
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Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 8:56 am
"I don't....I don't know...." she said faintly, immediately beginning to back away as the other wolf rose to his feet and began to close the distance between them again.
He was angry...she'd made him angry and she hadn't meant to. She had no idea who Tawna was...she'd never heard of a wolf by that name before -- kept by humans or otherwise.
"Please, I don't know...!"
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Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 9:23 am
She was lying. She had to be lying. There was simply no other explanation for how she would know the name of his dead mate whom he had not spoken of since the...the incident.
Drik may have been many unfavorable things to many people, but no one could ever have called him a liar. Never. No matter who it had made enemies of, no matter how ugly or fantastic it had seemed, he had always told the truth.
For the simple reason that liars were one of the few things he could put beneath himself, Drik detested those who lied to him.
"Tell me how you know her." he demanded, a simmering rage creeping into his voice. "Who are you??" Caution around the skittish omega had been thrown to the wind. Let her run. He would stop her.
Finding Risen Ashes had been his second chance...his salvation...and he was not going to let anyone take it away from him. Not his memories, and certainly not prying little wasps who wanted to dredge up his shame.
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Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 9:26 am
Mire was not so much backing up now as she was scrambling frantically, her eyes daring to dart backward now and again to check her escape routes.
The stench about him was stronger now...combined with the acrid scent of his rage, it formed a putrid sort of shroud about the larger male. Drik was death. Drik was sickness. Drik was what it looked like to die and yet still walk the earth.
This and many more panicked thoughts cycled through her mind at breakneck speed.
He meant to hurt her, she fretted. Hurt her at the LEAST if she didn't get away.
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Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 9:39 am
"I said TELL ME!!" he demanded, lips pulling back in a pearly snarl. Not giving her a chance to reply, Drik's panicked anger quickly got the better of him.
With a roar, he leapt upon the lesser brown female, jaws snapping at the air and leaving thin silver trails of slaver. He had to shut her up, he thought frantically. Before she could tell the others, he had to shut her up.
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Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 10:00 am
Drik's teeth and claws did not find purchase in her flesh, but to hear Mire's yelping scream, one would have thought he'd murdered her right then and there.
It was not, however, his attack that had frightened her so badly...at least not the one he'd intended for her.
No sooner had he leapt at her, than her mind had come to life once more with vivid and grotesque imagery, none of it her own.
She saw an unfamiliar den. She saw a sleek brown female licking what had once been a proud grey male on the muzzle. She saw cubs...tiny, deaf, and blind.
A family. A happy family.
But then, something was wrong. Blood. Rending of flesh and tiny dying shrieks of baby wolves.
What have you DONE?? a female's voice cried, filled with piteous horror. Another snarl, and then he was upon her as well.
The visions, along with their startling clarity and twisted content, vanished just as quickly as they had arrived, leaving Mire to her own thoughts again. With surprising force, she wriggled out from beneath her attacker.
She still did not know who Tawna was, but she knew now that Tawna was dead.
And Drik had been the one to kill her.
Without pausing, without looking back, Mire fled in a random direction as quickly as her legs would take her. It didn't matter where, exactly, they took her, as long as it was away. Far away from here and from him.
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Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 6:39 pm
"Drik!"
The authoritative voice stopped the beta dead in his tracks before he could pursue the retreating omega. A moment later Choma, Myrl, and Mimic loped into view, summoned by the noise.
"Drik, what happened?" Choma demanded, stopping short of the beta and looking at him expectantly.
"I don't know." the mangled male replied, keeping his head low and his ears flat. "But Mire..."
"Mire? Is she all right?" the golden female demanded.
"There's something wrong with that one." Drik warned, shooting a baleful glance in the direction the little omega had run off in. "She can't be trusted. She isn't right."
Without further hesitation, Choma loped in the direction Drik had indicated, searching for her wayward packmate. Drik looked after her and then lifted his eyes to find Myrl regarding him thoughtfully.
The two males locked eyes but neither spoke. Nothing needed to be said. Myrl, without words, clearly knew what had just happened...or at least the gist of it. But he wouldn't get involved...it wasn't his place or his business.
Not unless she had been hurt.
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Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 7:24 pm
Branches tore at her pelt, leaves battered her face, and still Mire didn't slow. Twice, she had thought she could smell Drik's sour scent directly behind her and had thought her lungs would burst with panic.
Her limbs burned, the air she breathed felt as though it had barbs on it, and it was not until she threatened to collapse with exhaust that she finally stopped, casting a wary look over her shoulder. Save for a few swaying branches that she had disturbed with her passage, there was nothing but silence behind her.
With a faint sigh, she collapsed where she stood, panting raggedly as her heart pounded in her chest with such force that pulsing black spots dazzled her vision.
What she had seen still haunted her mind...and likely would for a long time. But how had she known? Where had it come from? It had been too vivid to be a simple daydream, and his violent reaction to her speaking Tawna's name seemed to make whatever she had seen out to be incriminatingly true.
It was almost as though she had taken a brief look into the darkness of Drik's innermost thoughts.
But--but that wasn't possible! Minds were private and personal things, not gazing pools.
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Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 7:30 pm
Though the scent trail had been waning when Choma had first started off in pursuit of Mire, it had grown stronger as she had gained on her. The occasional broken branch or footprint in the mud likewise aided the alpha's search until, at last, she soundlessly leapt into a small clearing where, huddled close to the earth, was a familiar smallish shape.
Mire made no move to get up...it was debateable that she even knew Choma was there and the golden alpha found herself making a concerted effort not to be angry. Waking everyone up with her shrieking, leaving Drik even more confused than he normally was, and then leading her a blasted merry chase through the woods just to find her.
The omega's exhausted trembling, however, shifted Choma's feelings of annoyance into ones of pity.
"Are you hurt...?" she asked in as neutral of a voice as she could manage.
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Posted: Mon Apr 03, 2006 7:32 pm
Mire started immediately and looked up to Choma with shame flickering in her twin blue lanterns.
"I...I had to run. He--I didn't..." She stopped herself before she could start babbling and drew a deep breath. That was not what her alpha had asked, was it?
"No." she managed. "No, I'm not hurt."
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Posted: Tue Apr 04, 2006 7:23 am
"Good." For a long moment, she said only that.
"Mire..." she began at last. "...this can't continue. This fearing your other packmembers, jumping at shadows, late-night disturbances..."
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